CHAPTER XXV. 



A GROUND-SQUIRREL. — A MOUSE'S NEST. — HUMMING-BIRDS 



AND THEIR YOUNG ONES. THE LOCUST-TREE. MEXICAN 



WOLVES AND THEIR RETREAT. 



T WAS suddenly awakened by the report of a gun just 

 as the day was breaking. L'Encuerado showed me an 

 enormous squirrel, with a gray back and white belly— a spe- 

 cies which never climbs, and is, for this reason, called by 

 Indians amotli (ground-squirrel). This animal, which lives 

 in a burrow, has all the grace and vivacity of its kind, but 

 it can never be domesticated. It generally goes about in 

 numerous bands, and, when near cultivation, will commit in 

 a single night great destruction ; the farmers, consequently, 

 wage against it a war of extermination. 



Just as we were setting out, PEncuerado, whose arm was 



